Nero Fiddled
by Goddess33
Summary: Nero was ready to die when the black hole consumed the Narada. But someone- or something- is not ready to let him go. Is it a chance for further vengeance, or redemption?


"_Fire everything!"_

And they did. Every torpedo they had, unloaded in rapid succession, and Nero spared a brief moment to hope. They were still too close- _far too close-_ but if they ignited the red matter at this distance then went to warp immediately, there was a chance only Spock would be victim of the resulting black hole. And wouldn't that be poetic justice; Spock a victim of his own attempts of vengeance. Nero almost wished he would be able to linger to watch. He watched with a frantic anticipation as the torpedoes closed in unerringly on their target.

It was a shock when the first vanished in a blaze of phaser fire, followed in rapid succession by its companions. An eternal second of blank confusion passed before Nero realized the cause; the cavalry had arrived, in the form of the thrice-damned U.S.S. Enterprise. And with guns blazing, it took out every single missile that should have ended Spock's life. And Nero cursed his crew for doing their jobs too well. When he'd told them to fire everything, they'd fired _everything_, and the Narada had nothing left to combat this new threat. The Narada, at its heart, was truly only a mining vessel, not built for battle despite its imposing looks.

So there was nothing Nero could do- _there was never anything he could do, just like the last time, and please no, not again _- as imminent destruction hurtled toward the only thing that he had left.

His crew was already running. Where they thought they could escape to, Nero didn't know, nor could he spare a moment to care. This would be the second time someone had used their own ship as a weapon, driving it into a suicide collision with the heart of the Narada. Things had truly come full circle. But this time the results would be far more destructive than anything the U.S.S. Kelvin had managed.

Nero braced for impact, but when Spock's ship crashed into his own, there was hardly any. Narada was built hardy, and tiny as Spock's ship was, on its own it had as much affect as a bug attacking a view screen. Its true power came _after_ impact, in the explosion, and resulting implosion, of the entire bulk of red matter.

The Narada shuddered and shrieked, metal twisting and tearing itself apart. Lights flashed and fires burned, shouts and screaming erupting up from within the deepest bowels of the ship. His crew was running, desperate to escape, but Nero didn't run. There was nowhere to run to. There was no escape. The Federation had won. _Spock, damn him forever, had won. _

The main console alerted a hail from the attacking Enterprise. Ayel was gone, fled with the others, or dead perhaps, and so Nero answered it himself. Inexplicable calm descended on him as the screen presented him with those most hated faces, starship captain James T. Kirk, whom he really should have killed when he had the chance, and Spock, who should have _died_ damn it, sacrificed in the explosion that was even now destroying Nero's ship. Why wouldn't Spock just die already? Could he not give Nero even that small satisfaction?

It took Nero a moment to figure out what Kirk was saying to him. _"Your ship is compromised. You're too close to the singularity to survive without assistance, which we are willing to provide."_

So they thought to offer him salvation, did they? When he knew very well what would happen if he let them pull him out. He knew the tricks of the Federation- they'd promised to save Romulus too, and then stood by idle as the supernova burned the planet out of existence. Now they thought to offer him that same empty promise? He could die here, with dignity, or be dragged like an animal before their precious Federated Planets, to be executed to a chorus of cheers and fanfare. He could see them plotting even now, as first Spock, then Kirk turned their faces away, conversing in a hushed tone that Nero couldn't hear over their fizzling connection. And so he gave them the only answer he could.

"_I would rather suffer the destruction of Romulus a thousand times. I would rather die in _agony_, than accept assistance from you."_

With satisfaction, Nero noted the hatred on their faces, even Spock's, and he was pleased to have frustrated them this one last time. A small contentment, compared to what he'd wanted, what he'd almost achieved for his unknowing people, but he would take it.

"_You got it."_

The Enterprise fired phasers then, as if the black hole devouring the Narada was not a swift enough death for their liking. The Narada crumbled and tore like paper, shredding to pieces and disappearing into the singularity. Everything was shaking, everything was screaming. It would be over soon, Nero knew.

There was a sensation of impossible weight, of being crushed back into his seat; Nero would not have been able to run even if he'd wanted to. He wondered, briefly, if he was the last of his crew alive. He could no longer hear them over the noise. That, he supposed, he could find some regret in. They'd been a ragged group of miners and mercenaries, but loyal beyond measure to him and his cause.

Nero closed his eyes. Perhaps his vengeance had not been complete, but he'd gotten some measure of retribution for his lost planet, for… her. The Federation had been weakened, and perhaps one of his kinsmen of this timeline would one day finish what Nero had started.

The world around him cracked and splintered, but Nero paid it no mind. Finally, for one brief, precious moment, with his very last breath, Nero felt at peace.

_.x.x.x._

Nero was aware of brightness. Even with his eyes closed, he could sense it. It surrounded him, fluttered along his skin. He twitched, trying to brush off the sensation, and it retreated only a moment, only to return- a bright awareness, touching and testing, considering him with an almost childlike curiosity.

Beyond the brightness, there were voices. Hundreds, talking in hushed, low tones. Whispers really, as though they were trying not to disturb him, but so many voices together created a gentle white noise, a murmuring sea of sound. Nero scowled without opening his eyes- from what he could tell, the voices were speaking Vulcan. If he had to guess, he'd think they were talking about him. He hadn't held out much hope for any kind of afterlife, but it seemed he'd been doomed to some version of purgatory. He wouldn't open his eyes, wouldn't give any of those bastards the satisfaction.

"Are you awake now?"

That one, a woman, spoke Federation Standard, and she spoke directly to Nero. He decided to ignore her too. He heard her draw closer, the sounds of heavy fabric shifting as she crouched down next to him. That drew his attention to the fact that he seemed to be lying down on a floor of some sort. That surprised him a little, though he'd already deduced that he wasn't on the Narada anymore. How could he be, when the Narada had been destroyed, and presumably him along with it? He didn't feel destroyed, however. Strange as it was, especially if this was somebody's version of hell, he didn't feel too bad at all.

Something poked him in the shoulder. The woman, he presumed. He didn't react. She waited a moment, then touched his forehead, her fingertips tracing lightly over the curves of his tattoos. Automatically, he reacted, snatching her hand away from him and sitting up in a swift move to glare at her.

Slightly startled by the sudden move, but clearly amused all the same, she looked back at him without fear. She was human, an older woman, with time and sadness evidenced on her face in delicate lines. Her hair was tied back primly, a strange shade between brown and gray. Though she was definitely a human, she was dressed like a Vulcan.

And speaking of Vulcans; behind the woman, there were. _Vulcans. _Hundreds. Possibly more than hundreds; it was hard for Nero to tell from that vantage point. Standing there, looking very prim and stodgy, watching Nero with those dispassionate faces. Men, women and children. Now that he was clearly awake and aware of them, they'd stopped murmuring to each other, and were simply watching. Nero got the most irrational urge to back away. He ignored it.

"It's alright, Nero," the human woman said. "No one here is going to hurt you."

"Speak for yourself," another voice, male this time, spoke up. The Vulcans parted, and another human stepped forward. This man was dressed in what was unmistakably a Starfleet uniform, and his hands were clenched with what Nero guessed to be a barely contained desire to hit someone. Most likely Nero.

"George," the woman said, part gentle, part scolding. "We agreed."

"You agreed. The Vulcans agreed. I didn't agree," the man, identified as George, replied.

George. Nero knew the name, recognized the face now, the echoes of which he was familiar with, in the face of the son, James T. Kirk. This was the man that had piloted the starship _Kelvin_ into the Narada in desperate, and ultimately successful, bid to protect the escape pods. In the twenty-five years that Nero had been waiting, he'd had enough time to study, the history of the current timeline, and to reconcile it with what he knew of the history of his own time. He'd reveled in the differences he'd made. George Kirk had been meant to live, and Nero had killed him. One of the first deaths of many. The first victory of many.

"I remember you," Nero told George, watching as the human's eyes narrowed on him. "Tell me, what did you think about in those final moments? Did you think about your pretty wife, and how you would never see her again? Or perhaps your son, wondering what he would look like, what he would grow up to be, knowing you would never get to see it, never even get to hold him once? Did you wonder if the specter of your death would haunt them both for the rest of their lives, driving them mad, or that maybe they would move on and forget all about you?"

Those human hands clenched tighter. Nero wondered how much he would have to taunt the man before he actually took a swing at him. He started to do just that, but the woman cut him off.

"Enough, Nero," she said. "Haven't you had enough?"

"Enough?" He scrambled to his feet, pausing a moment because he hadn't realized just how dizzy dying had made him. "If you think _anything_ would be enough, after the loss of my home, after Spock allowed them all to burn-"

"My son," she said clearly, rising with far more grace than Nero, "would never have _allowed_ such a thing."

Nero appraised her again. He could see it now, a little around the eyes maybe. "You're Spock's mother."

She inclined her head in agreement.

"And you're the man that killed her," George said. Some of the tension seemed to have left him- this was more a statement, than an accusation. He made a gesture to indicate all the silently watching Vulcans around him "Through your actions, you've killed everyone here."

Nero looked at him, then at her. "Are you expecting an apology?"

"Are you sorry?" she asked.

"No."

"Then no, an apology isn't necessary at the moment. You can give one later, when you mean it."

Nero scoffed, but didn't bother correcting her _badly_ mistaken impression that at any point in time, he would ever regret any of his actions.

"I have someone I want you to meet," she said.

The crowd parted again, and allowed one to step forward- this was a young Vulcan, in the midst of his formative years, with the same expressionless mask of a face that all his kind wore. He stepped up beside the human woman, looking up at Nero without fear, without reproach, without anything but curiosity. And sadness. Nero could sense the sadness, hot and cold and sharp and dull in turns, carefully but not completely held in check within that child.

Nero felt satisfaction. He had given this boy that pain, the pain that echoed his own. He'd brought all the Vulcans this pain, exactly as he had intended.

"This is Senek," the woman said. "When your drill caused earthquakes all across Vulcan, Senek was mostly crushed by a collapsing building. He lived, but barely. He was one of the few they managed to evacuate when the order came. Currently, he is in a medical shuttle, headed for Earth, where they will make every effort to save his life. They're not sure he's going to make it."

Nero had no idea why she thought he would care. Did she intend to introduce him to every Vulcan who lost their lives that day, in the hopes that their stories would elicit the regret she sought?

"The surgery will be successful, and Senek will live," the woman said. She touched the boy's shoulder lightly, and he walked past Nero without another glance. Nero half turned to watch him go, but behind Nero there was nothing- just an obscuring whiteness into which Senek had disappeared.

"And so will you, Nero." The human woman gave Nero a push- hardly anything at all, certainly nothing compared to his Romulan strength. And yet Nero found himself toppled, falling backward…

…and falling…

…and falling…

_.x.x.x._

Nero was far less comfortable when he woke next. His chest felt tight, his legs felt numb, and despite the heavy blanket draped over him, he was cold. He lay very still, listening, trying to determine where he was. There were sounds of people nearby, feet clicking on hard floors, talking to one another, some tones serious, some friendly. They were speaking, for the most part, Federation Standard. And there were less natural sounds, soft beeps and clicks of mechanics.

He opened his eyes slowly, almost wincing at the brightness of the light. It was not as bright as the other place, and yet here it hurt his eyes, whereas it had not wherever he had been before this.

There was equipment around him, looking medical in nature, though he didn't recognize most of it. This was not Romulan technology; this looked like the sleek, plastic, streamlined crap that humans would build. He was in a human hospital?

He levered himself up slowly into a sitting position, categorizing every ache and pain that ricocheted through him. There were quite a few. He felt like he'd taken quite a beating.

Nero looked at his hands, startled by how _wrong_ they looked. It wasn't just the mottled, dark green bruising along their surface, evidencing injuries Nero didn't remember receiving. They were smaller hands than they should be, with slender, tapered fingers. There was no evidence that they had ever been tattooed in the way Nero's hands were- should be.

He stumbled out of bed in a sudden, near panic, desperate for some sort of reflective surface to confirm what he suspected, what he feared. There was a tiny bathroom to one side of the hospital room, and Nero shuffled into it. It was hard to make his legs move- they were still numb, and stiff. And shorter than he remembered. A child's legs.

Nero stared at himself in the bathroom's mirror. A face not his own stared back at him. It was the boy's face, the Vulcan child that he'd seen in that other place. His appearance was Vulcan in every aspect, from the carefully groomed, short black hair, to the slant of the eyebrows, to the way the ears curved to a point just a little bit differently than a Romulan's. Nero touched each of these features, just to make sure he wasn't imagining them.

He wasn't. Nero was a Vulcan now.


End file.
